Hats off to our friends over at lochaberhighlandestate.blogspot.co.uk for this well-researched article, which reveals that the Bevis clan have actually been faking newspaper articles about their sca… err businesses. Genuine critical content has been adulterated to rosy reviews, as e.g. when the newspaper heading “MSP [Rob Gibson] warns it exploits Scotland” was altered to “MSP welcomes boost for Scotland”. One of many examples in the blog article, which we highly recommend reading.

Apparently, Highland Titles have set up a domain named newsfeed.ws (currently down) on which they have created numerous subdomains named after well-known newspapers, e.g. dailyrecord.newsfeed.ws, etc., making the subdomains look like newsfeeds from the real publishing houses. Quite ingenious, if we may say so. (If only the Bevises could put their cunning to good use instead… :sigh:) Naturally, the domain newsfeed.ws is privacy protected, but Highland Titles cannot escape the fact that they have been linking to it from their official website.

What confounds us is how they actually thought they could get away with it? With all the negative publicity Highland Titles are getting, did they really think nobody would ever discover that the articles were doctored? Not to mention the trouble they could get into for impersonating newspapers and using their trademarked names in subdomains. If Highland Titles were American, they would have a UDRP filed against them faster than they could say “cash”.

Tut tut, all the while Peter Bevis is on record claiming Highland Titles do not clone websites. This is low – and risky – even for Highland Titles. As Andrew, a poster over at scots-titles.com, puts it: there really is nothing more to say.

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7 thoughts on “Fake Newspaper Articles”

No surprise there really, everything about Highland Titles is seems is fake, the deeper you dig the smellier it gets. Fits in with their fake Friends Of Glencoe Facebook page too, another shining example of scumbag behaviour.

Maybe somebody should clone the Highland Titles web site and put their own content in it, Highland Titles seem to think that kind of behaviour is very acceptable, so can’t see why they would object, get a matching domain name to go with it, say highlandshitles.com LOL … Oh hold on, some people actually have some principles and might not be keen to use the intellectual property and trademarks of others.quite so freely as Highland Titles seem to feel they are entitled to.

Damn, I put the words principles and Highland Titles in the same sentence, that can’t be right!

Talking of Highland Titles’ Facebook page, I see that they have proudly displayed a picture of the Sunday Mail article (12/05/2013) but only after carefully cropping out the headline “Gathering of the Shams”, which is a bit too accurate for their liking.

Their précis of the piece, naturally puts a spin on it that was not in the original:

“The Mail on Sunday wrote a rather tongue in cheek page in today’s paper explaining that our supporters are ordinary people with an extraordinary vision for a new way of doing conservation.”

I hadn’t read Bevis’s post in full for a while. The wounded pomposity is jaw-dropping in the light of its exposure as a brazen lie.

To learn, though, that HT is “an organisation intent on doing some good” is a comfort to those locals who have not been impressed by the tawdry exploitation of the Glencoe name, and now the faking of newspapers.

Who knows? In time they may come to love the Alderney-based scammers who for their own sordid commercial motives edited Wikipedia to relocate Glencoe Village outside the Glen (“The village is not actually in Glencoe but occupies an area known as Carnoch.”):

[Why the edit? HT were at the time still trying to maintain the pretence their land was in Glencoe. One of their more imaginative attempts to muddy the water was to argue that it was fair game to describe their land as in Glencoe since Glencoe Village wasn’t in Glencoe either, hence the Wikipedia edit.]

Thanks, guys. Certainly a surprise to the villagers who can look out their windows and SEE they’re in the glen, see the mountains on both sides and the Glen’s river, the Coe, running past down to Loch Leven.

Uncle Peter knows best, I guess.

I’ll try not to view this little stunt as indicative of his real level of respect for the Highlands and its inhabitants (i.e. any deceit goes as long as it brings the $ in to Alderney).

Oh yes, great chances, we should think. The Bevises will take their imagination anywhere they think there is money to be made by fooling the public in some way, but an element of trickery seems to be prerequisite to get their imaginations flowing.

It is a shame, really. With all those natural abilities, a doctor in natural science, a barrister, and with that boundless imagination, think of all the legal respectable trades they could have succeeded in.

Another interesting post on Lochaber Highland Blogspot yesterday, asking what happened to the much-vaunted charity that Dr Bevis promised on Bletherskite back in December. There was no mention of it in either of the artcles published by the Mail and as may be seen on the blog, it mysteriously vanished from the schedule….

Thought you might want to see what the Private Eye article about the Highland Titles scam cloned web sites actually said. From Private Eye issue number 1339 page 11.

“HIGHLAND Titles, one of the largest firms
selling ludicrous fake lairdships as gifts, has
been given a slap on the wrist by advertising’s
watchdogs after tidying up press cuttings on its
website to remove any hint that the scheme Is a
scam.

The Guernsey-based firm, which sells Laird
and Ladyships of Glencoe, although the Glencoe
Woods being sold by the metre aren’t even part of
the Glencoe estate (see Eye 1328), has a web page
of links to press coverage from Scotland and
around the world. While the articles looked like
the real deal, they were actually mock-ups with
cunningly disguised web addresses, such as
dailyrecord.newsfeed.ws. The Daily Record
article was largely copied from a real one but had
been doctored to expunge the words “scam” and
‘phoney”.

Meanwhile an otherwise genuine article from
the San Francisco Chronicle was tweaked to
remove a paragraph noting: “The offer has been
attacked as a fraud by internet critics.”
The Advertising Standards Authority
investigated the website and closed its file on the
complaint after Highland Titles agreed to remove
all links to the fake articles (though the fakes
themselves remain online)”

It is actually quite difficult to fully comprehend the utterly disgraceful behaviour the above demonstrates. Perhaps Highland Titles were relying on nobody believing anybody would have the cheek to do such a thing? No luck there then, they have been well found out!